


I am Flesh and I am Bone

by Katowisp



Series: Fairytales and Other Forms of Suicide [8]
Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Angst, Avenger Loki (Marvel), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Gen, Hurt Steve Rogers, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, POV Loki (Marvel), Steve Rogers Feels
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-24
Updated: 2019-03-09
Packaged: 2019-11-04 17:35:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,556
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17902502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Katowisp/pseuds/Katowisp
Summary: Coda to Fairytales and other Forms of Suicide. This is Loki's interlude, while Steve is learning to live without him. Loki finds a new friend. He knew Steve, but Loki doesn't (remember.)





	1. Rabid Bits of Time

_I'm dreamin' of a place I cannot explain_  
So let me sleep on my train  
So the world, so the world goes by  
  
-Tom Rosenthal

Loki always knew where West was. The looming peaks of the Rockies ensured it, and Loki knew he could always find his way home if only he could locate the mountains. Tall and snow-peaked, ready to catch the sun in all their glory, they were a steadfast presence in Loki’s life.

The evening sun settled in a brilliant explosion of reds and purples, and Loki wondered, not for the first time, why the setting sun was always so much more brilliant in the winter. The Solstice was only a few days away, and he wondered if maybe it was the last great cry of the sun during these days of truncated light. 

Hands shoved deep in his woolen over coat, worn and nearly threadbare, he pulled his scarf tightly around him. The shops of the downtown district were brightly lit with Christmas lights, and cheery paper Santa’s beckoned for Loki to enter and buy useless things for friends and family he didn’t have. 

Gathered homeless eyed Loki, and their eyes said, “You’ll be here soon.” And they did not ask him for money.

Loki squared his shoulders and barreled past them. He had never begged once in his life, and he was not anxious to start any time soon. However, his stomach growled in complaint and the smells drifting out of the restaurants beckoned him and he cursed, not for the first time, that he had no money for dinner. 

Leaning against a stone wall and watching the rest of humanity wander by, bundled in their winter clothes, their bright faces smiling despite the cold that touch their cheeks; made them rosy.

Loki wondered where he would stay the night. The fact that he couldn’t remember where he’d stayed the night before didn’t bother him. He was a leaf on the wind, and the world moved around him. 

Loki could hear the strains of a Christmas carol drifting out of a shop, and he hastened inside to find warmth and welcome. The shop keeper bellowed a greeting before turning back to a customer. No one spared him a second look, and Loki was fine with that. 

Appreciating the warmth of the heated shop, he idly browsed through the proffered goods, hands skipping over locally made stoneware. Picking up a mug, feigning interest, Loki wondered himself what he’d do for food. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten, and the free water from the local coffee shop had been offered with a glare and handed over in a small, plastic cup. Loki had filled it up as many times as he could, in shop bathrooms, before it’d finally crinkled and cracked from the stress. His throat was parched and his stomach was empty, and he was looking at overpriced mugs. 

He set down the blue-glazed mug heavily and turned away, heading out of the shop. He didn’t belong here. There was nothing for him. What would he do with a fancy mug?

As the sun set and the night grew close, the walking mall grew even more crowded with college students, freshly off studying and finals. Carousing the streets in their designer clothes, Loki considered how easy it would be to life a few dollars from them, especially as the night grew and they celebrated their finals with drunken revelry.

Loki was not a beggar, but a little pickpocketing was not beneath him. It required skill, and there was something to say about that.

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

Loki took trains and cars and semis, and he saw the America forgotten.

He passed across large swaths of land, largely untrodden save for pioneering teens or weary truckers. He explored America’s East, confined by interstates lined with tight forests that shielded the sky, south all the way to Key West, where he stood and on graveled sands and watched the sun rise, and then watched it set. 

And when he was done with the rhythmic crashing of water against sand and an endless blue sky that stretched away into forever, he found a ride back to the Mainland and traveled along Florida’s West Coast, across the Pan Handle and into Louisiana and Texas, where the bayous gave way to rolling hills and eventually desert. He saw the Southwest and the great arches of Utah, the Grand Canyon (and it was familiar, but he didn’t know why. Standing on its Southern Rim, he looked deep into the abyss, the silver ribbon of the Colorado glittering below, and he wondered why, when all his other memories were locked away, this place was familiar.)

In Denver, Colorado, Loki always knew where West was. The looming Rockies, forbidding and capped in snow were surer than the sun; more reliable than a compass. 

And so Loki went west, to California, where he stood on the beaches and looked out across the Pacific, wondering about the lands that lay out of sight. He headed north, to the misty, but temperate, days of Seattle where he spent the winter and wondered where he’d go next. 

He traversed the great Mojave desert, and although it held a great many secrets, none of them were his and he moved on. 

Loki saw the Badlands of Montana and the open plains of Wyoming and Colorado’s great Rockies, and he appreciated a year of sunrises and sunsets, but still, his memory escaped him. And so he went east again, felt it pulling in his soul, and he hoped that if he stumbled upon his home, his memories would come back.

He felt as a ghost upon the land, affecting nothing. It disquieted him, and he pushed on. 

While the landscape passed by him, Loki wondered about where he’d come from and where he was going. He couldn’t remember anything at all about his whole life (and he had a suspected he’d live much longer than the face in the mirror belied), except the deep seated feeling of not belonging. 

In Charlottesville, Virginia, Loki meandered the brick-laden streets of the historic district, oblivious to the old man in the flannel shirt until he’d run into him. He dropped a paper bag, fruits and foodstuff bouncing and rolling against the brick and into the center ditch before lumbering to a stop against an iron grate. 

Loki knelt to pick up the fallen fruit, helping the old man repack his grocery bags. The man, his white hair wispy and scarce on his spotted head, his brown eyes clear but lined from years of life, his mouth heavily lined, looked at Loki with eyes that were sharp and were absent of any senility or confusion. He wore a baseball cap that had four ivy leaves in a yellow diamond. Loki hesitated, recognizing the sigil but unable to place it. 

“Thank you,” the man said, holding out a hand. Loki dropped a clementine into it. 

“Do you need help to your car?”

“I can manage,” the man said, scooping to pick up his bags. Loki quickly interceded, lifting the bags effortlessly. 

“I insist.”

For a year, Loki had been a man apart. But there was something about this old man with his ivy leaves that drew him. As if remembering what it meant and why it was important would slide missing pieces into place.

The man considered him for a moment with wary eyes before he nodded, a tired smile cracking his stern features. “I’m this way,” He indicated, moving slowly in the direction of an old Ford. It was beaten with age and clearly older than most of the cars in the parking lot. “You can just unload them in the bed.”

“You’re from the Fourth Division,” Loki realized as he unloaded the bags. And he didn’t know why he knew that, but there were a lot of things he knew.

“You Army?”

“No, just interested in history,” Loki hedged as he dropped the bags over the aged red truck.

“World War II, Sergeant Jones. But I’m just George now,” The old man proffered a hand, which Loki took readily.

“It’s an honor, Sergeant.”

There had been another Sergeant, once. Barrels? Ben? His name was just beyond the reaching, and it scratched at Loki’s brain.

“George is fine. I’ve been a civilian a long time now.”

“Do you live near here?”

“Out in the country, about forty minutes east. Richmond’s a closer haul, but I like Charlottesville better.”

“It’s a beautiful city,” Loki agreed. If he were being completely honest, it was just like every other old city in America. The names of the shops and the bars were different, but the worn brick was the same. 

“You’re not from around here,” George guessed, leaning against his truck bed.

“No.”

“You in need of a job?”

“In this economy, who isn’t?” Loki asked with a wry smile. Because he’d traveled the country enough to know that everybody was hurting, and he didn’t have to be in full capacity of his memories to know that. 

“You’re young and strong. My wife is dead and my children are scattered to the four winds. I expect you’ve never worked in the country and I can’t promise you much excitement or money, but I’ve got room and board if’n you can help around the property. It’s not much, but it’s something. My kids say I should move into assisted living. Not as long as I live and breathe I won’t.”

Loki, leaning against the opposite end of the truck bed hesitated. He had nowhere to go, didn’t know where he was from; his scattered memory offered up tidbits of information when it seemed important, but besides that, he was a leaf on the wind. 

“Anyway, interested? I normally wouldn’t extend an offer, but not too many folk around here recognize the Ivy.”

“I’ve got nowhere else to go.”

“I hate to think I’m you’re last resort, but it’s better than nothing.”

“It would be my honor.”

“Then climb aboard.”

Loki pulled open the passenger’s door with a heavy creaking noise and climbed in.


	2. Sweating Your Sins Out

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki learns how to milk a cow and cut wood. George tells him about the greatest hero he ever knew, Captain America

_And we set out to the sea from this city of the damned  
Floating in a boat without a captain  
I'll guide us through the waves with my weak and tired hands  
Hoping that the morning will find us_

-Jaako Aukusti

George Jones lived on a hundred acres of property off the James River in Goochland, Virginia. After pulling off I-64, they traveled country roads until George finally turned left onto an old dirt road, almost hidden behind a copse of old hardwoods.

“My Granddaddy worked this land,” George said as they bounced along the rough road. George guided the truck with an experienced hand along the extended driveway. “And his Grandaddy before him. My family fought in the War Between the States. We owned over a thousand acres but we had to sell most of them off after the War to pay the debts. I grew up here.”

Loki could feel his teeth rattling in his head as they bounced along rocks and culvert up to the house. He didn’t know anything about what George talked about, so instead he said, “It’s beautiful.”

“Mostly, trees have grown where the fields were. But it’s home.”

The dirt driveway opened up into a huge field, barren land with broken corn stalks, recently harvested. They rattled along, past the cornfield and into a pasture, a great house looming before them. The original house almost perfectly square, with great stone stairs leading up to a wrap around porch. The bulk of the house was brick, but it had been clearly added and expanded in its life, and great wooden wings jutted off the main body. 

George pulled up along side the house and climbed out. He was a spry old man despite his age, but Loki noted the way his back was curved, the joints of his hands curled and swollen.

Loki was not a strong man, but unloading the groceries was an easy feat. He followed George up the old steps. A giant German shepherd came loping across the fields, heralding their arrival with great, deep barks. George called him to his side. 

“This is General."

Loki and General eyed one another. General’s ears laid backward and his haunches raised as his lips curled around sharp teeth.

“Shh, Jackson. It’s all right. This is Loki, he’s my new farm hand.”

The shepherd barked once, either in agreement or rebellion, and settled into a sitting position beside George. 

“Loki, it’s a strange name.”

“It’s all I have,” Loki said honestly. He could remember nothing of his life; could not even remember the head injury that had apparently stolen his memories. Sometimes, in his dreams, there was another, with vivid blue eyes and closely cropped blond hair, and Loki wondered who he was; why he persisted in his broken memory when nothing else did. 

He followed George up the stairs; surprised the old man could climb them as easily as he did. George indicated the location of the kitchen before settling into a worn armchair, placed carefully both before an empty fireplace and in a pool of sunlight.

Loki began unloading the groceries as he saw fit. He marveled at the house. The floors were almost exclusively marble, opening up to plastered walls that reached expansively, almost twenty feet in height. Priceless oils depicting dramatic sea battles and pastoral scenes and the great rocky monuments of the West and delicately captured family members cracked with age that hung in gilded frames. 

When he was done, Loki filled an old aluminum pot and set it on the stove, allowing it to warm. When it was ready, it whistled, and Loki poured the boiling water into a pot he’d found as well as loose tea. Setting it onto a silver platter, Loki carried the silver teapot along with two porcelain mugs out to the old man.

He’d fallen asleep in his spot in the sun, but roused when Loki set a cup on the table aside him. 

“Thank you, son,” George said, clasping his ancient hands around the delicate porcelain, reveling in its warmth.

Loki took his own cup, delicately painted in flowers and lined in gold, and settled in the blue claw-footed sofa across from George. There was a chill in the air, and after a moment, Loki moved to start the fire. Several logs had been placed in the alcove, and it was simply a matter of adding the available newspaper as starter and applying a match. 

They watched the fire grow, slowly becoming a roaring thing that sputtered and spat, throwing embers against the fire shield Loki had moved back in place.

“Tell me your story, Loki.”

“I do not know it,” Loki said. “Tell me yours.”

George smiled. “I have lived many years, and my family, even more, and it is a long story.”

“I have nowhere to go.”

George laughed. “Fair enough.”

And so George told him of Harmony on the James. A general had been bequeathed the land by King George, and it had traded hands several times before it landed in the possession of the Jones’, who’d turned it into a prosperous Southern plantation, complete with slaves and vast tobacco fields. “It’s contentious. But it’s my history. I know it wasn’t right, but it’s the way it was. The way I was raised—but the men I went to war with, they deserved respecting. They way I was raised was wrong.” George explained. The house, and the land, had remained in the family of the Jones’ ever since. Its key location on the James had allowed easy passage to Richmond and upriver, to Charlottesville’s Rivanna, and the family had been prosperous for all the years leading up to the War Between the States. 

Four generations had lived here, and their portraits were on the grand staircase. George had been married here, and his wife had born his firstborn son here, shortly before he’d gone off to war. His daughter and younger sons had been born here, too. And some of them had died here, too. 

Ten years ago, his wife, Mabel, died in their bed. The doctors declared it a heart attack, and they had the wake in the parlor. The family cemetery was on the hill overlooking the river. One late afternoon, Loki stared at the old stones, and wondered at the people beneath them. 

Loki allowed the old man to talk, realizing he was the only one left to hear his story. His children had grown and left. They had families of their own, and although they occasionally came home, their visits were sparse. The old plantation was inconvenient to any airport, and life kept them busy. 

George had a flat screen TV, gifted to him by his middle son, prosperous in “Computers, or something,” George confided. He also had an Internet connection so he could check e-mails, although he admitted he allowed his inbox to pile up. Checking it and notifying him of important e-mails would be one of Loki’s duties.

“Besides groceries, what use am I?” 

George laughed. “I am old and near death and you are young and have never worked the land. You will be my farm hand. I mostly live off retirement and trusts and subsidies from the government, but my fields still needing tilling and my house still needs upkeep.”

“I don’t know how to do these things.”

“I will teach you.”

0o0o0o0o0o0o

George had an old sow he kept handy for his daily milk, and enough chickens to provide daily eggs. Loki learned how to milk the heffer and gather eggs, and how to lock up the coop so the foxes wouldn’t come in the night.

When it snowed in February, Loki worked on the house. George kept it as best as he could, but four generations of Jones’ had resulted in a lot of clutter, and Loki organized it as best he could.

He found old newspaper clippings and headings. One declared the Second Great War was over. One was an obituary for George’s third oldest son, killed in Vietnam. Some were of a man in an ostentatious uniform, surrounded by men with the ivy leaf image embroidered on their sleeves.

Loki hesitated, staring at the grainy man. He held a huge shield, round and in varying shades of gray. A star stood prominently in the center. The subtext read, “Captain America strategized with men of the Fourth Division.”

That evening, as they watched the nightly news, Loki chanced, “Who was Captain America?”

George brightened, years lifting from his face. He gave Loki a smile that twinkled, and Loki could see a young man looking out at him. “He was the greatest hero of our war. Of any war. He had the strength of a hundred men, and never tired. He saved my division more than once. He saved me, in the forests of Germany. He saved the world and gave his life for it. Maybe,” George said the last part with a sly look, his eyes bright.

“Maybe?”

George grinned and shuffled the papers in the magazine holder beside his chair. He proffered a paper that showed a nearly identical man in full color, surrounded by a team in similarly ridiculous clothing against a scene of mayhem. The uniform and shield were slightly different, but the honest face was the same. Loki looked at George with a quirked eyebrow as he checked the date.

“It’s impossible,” Loki said.

“That’s what I thought,” George agreed. “He was lost at the end of the war, just before Berlin fell. The details around his disappearance were classified, and all was said was he’d crashed in the Arctic Ocean saving all of us. But a few years ago, he popped up again in Germany, and again in Manhattan, leader of the team fighting off an alien an invasion.”

“Aliens?” Loki scoffed.

“Read the article,” George instructed. “I couldn’t believe it either.”

Loki looked at the clippings. “He hasn’t aged a day.”

“Impossible, I know. But, as sure as I am breathing, that’s Captain America. The same one. Do you know him?” George looked up.

Loki stared at the picture. Captain America was clearly favoring one side, stained in red. Behind him, a man in anachronistic armor and a silly red cape stood with a chiseled jaw and sharp eyes, and flanked by a woman in a tight uniform and a robot in bright oranges and reds. A massive creature with a mop of black hair and freakishly green skin glared at the photographer, his eyes, dark against his skin, piercing into the eyes of the viewer. Just behind him, barely noticeable, was a blond clad in black, clasping a compound bow. The headline declared, “Avengers save Earth!”

Loki could feel his memory give, but it would not provide him with the information needed. He traced a delicate finger over the captain’s face.

“I don’t think so,” Loki said.

“Pity,” George pulled the paper out of Loki’s hands. “He was the greatest man I’ve ever known.”

0o0o0o0o0o0o0o0o

It was a long winter, and George set Loki to cutting firewood. It was hard work, and Loki felt his muscles complain almost instantly. A sharp wind chilled Loki’s sweat on his brow almost instantly and the sky was icy blue, wisps of ice clouds reflecting the cold sun. After a few hacks with an axe, old but delicately cared for, Loki threw the tool to the ground in frustration. The wood remained stoic on the cutting block. Every time he swung, he seemed to hit a different place and the oak was studded with multiple cuts, none deep enough to cause a split.

“You’re doing it all wrong, boy,” George called from the porch. 

“I’d like to see you do better,” Loki snapped in annoyance. George raised a fuzzy eyebrow. Tottering down the stairs carefully, he made his way to the woodpile.

“Who do you think split all this wood?”

“You’re too old for this work.”

“That’s why I asked you to do it. It makes my bones creak and my muscles ache for a week after. You’re a city boy. Never learned how to use an axe. There’s some strength required, sure, but it’s mostly technique.”

Loki scoffed again.

George scooped the axe up off the ground and curled his gnarled hands around it. He moved his right hand up the shaft, keeping his left hand low in the grip. “It’s just the law of physics. Use momentum and gravity to your advantage. Eyeball where you want your axe to go, and then swing.” George hefted the axe up. “When you bring it down, pull your dominant hand--you right handed? Yeah? Okay, so just bring your hand down the shaft.”

George swung down, his dominant hand joining his left, the axe embedding deeply in the wood. He stepped away, the axe still embedded in the wood. “This is the part that requires strength. Go ahead now. Pull it out and you try.”

Loki frowned, grasping the axe and struggling with it before it became unstuck, the force of the motion causing Loki to stagger. He replicated the movement George had just shown him.

The blade came down true, opening the crack in the wood slightly more.

“Like that, until it’s split.”

George watched Loki until he’d completed his first log. “Good work. Get a few more logs done and then you can come in.”

Loki watched George start back up the stairs, the old door closing heavily. It was only after George was gone that Loki realized he’d been sneering the entire time. 

He was oddly ashamed.

Loki worked all afternoon, taking breaks when his muscles grew weary. He’d sit on the splitting log and look out over the James, allowing his thoughts to drift as he considered the sky reflected against the water. He tried to remember who he was without much success. He could only remember glimpses--gilded halls hung in silk tapestries, a man with eyes shaped as hourglasses--and when that didn’t make sense, he grew frustrated and took back up the axe. 

When the sun had begun to set, burnished orange against the winter trees, Loki finally called it quits. Leaning the axe against the side of the house, he climbed the old steps wearily. As his body cooled from his day’s work, the ache of muscles unused to work grew. 

George had fallen asleep in his great armchair, his head resting against his chest as he breathed deeply. The fire was little more than embers, and Loki added another log, stoking it with an ancient iron tool he’d seen George use. 

Before he’d fallen asleep, the old man had made tea. It sat in a porcelain pot on a silver platter. His own teacup was half finished, and Loki filled the remaining cup. The liquid had grown tepid, but he sipped it anyway.

He sat and stared into the flames, wondering what, exactly, he was doing.

0o0o0o0o0o

“Were you Afghanistan?” George asked on a Sunday afternoon. Loki was busy cleaning the fireplace, and he turned to look at George in surprise, his face marked with soot.

“No,” Loki finished sweeping the soot into a bag. “I’ve never been in the military.” Not that he remembered, anyway.

“You’ve got the look of someone who’s seen a lot.” George settled his old bones into his armchair. “We used to call it shell shock, and nobody talked about it. Now it’s PTSD, and it’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Loki said nothing, standing with the bag in his hand. “I’ll take this out.”

“Put some on the compost pile. The rest can go in the woods.”

It was unseasonably warm and dry, and Loki walked across the field, the wind pulling at his hair. As he glanced out across the James, his memory tugged at him. He paused, staring out across the water in the hopes it would jog his absent memories. But the moment was gone, and the James was just a river, and he continued his trudge across the grass.

When he made it back inside, the TV was on, tuned to the local news channel. A box in the corner declared it to be “Breaking news” and a harried woman was standing in San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge smoking behind her. “For those of you just tuning in, I’m here in San Francisco where an unknown entity is attacking--Jesus Christ!” There was an explosion, and the camera spun wildly. When the camera man righted himself, he zoomed past the anchor, to where drones were floating above the city, shooting buildings seemingly at random.

“My god, the people,” the reporter breathed as a building went up in flames, the jittery camera zooming in on people hanging out the windows, smoke and flames exploding outward from the building.

Loki came to rest behind George, placing a hand on the arm chair. George glanced at him before turning the volume up on the TV, face tense.

As they watched, a twinjet came into view along with the fierce colors of Iron Man.

Loki thought, _how ostentatious_. 

Soon the rest of the Avengers were piling out. The Hulk was there, jumping among buildings, and although he couldn’t see the arrows, he saw the result of Hawkeye’s work as drones exploded in midair. 

The camera zoomed back in on the anchor, a hand pressed to her ear, a look of relief across her face. “We’ve just confirmed the Avengers have arrived. We’ll be cutting to James, who is on the streets of San Francisco and has eyes on our heroes.”

The feed switched to a dapper man with black hair. He tried to look confident despite the shaking ground and the debris that rained down around him. “The Avengers are here and we have reports that the Fantastic Four and the X-men are en route. However, SHIELD says the enemy will be routed before they get here. Oh--did you get that?”

The camera changed views, shifting away from James and zooming to Captain America, who was ducking under his shield as he caught a barrage of lasers aimed at him. Loki could hear George’s breath catch, only to be expelled with a whoop as the Captain lowered his shield and quickly launched it once the attack was over. 

“You get him, Cap!” George yelled at the TV as a drone was knocked out by the flying disc. George twisted to look up at Loki, and for a moment, he was a young man, eyes bright and smile wide. “That’s my Cap,” He breathed. 

Loki settled into the other chair, watching as the fight was documented on the TV. When it was over, George turned to him, more animated than Loki had ever seen. “The fools down at the VFW say it’s not the same Captain, that the government is trying to cash in on nostalgia. But I’d know my man anywhere. You never forget the one who saved you. I saw some of the video of his face in New York. That’s the same man. I dunno how, but it is,” George finished firmly.

Loki didn’t answer; his eyes sliding back to the TV. The fight was wrapping up. He saw the one called Thor helping a civilian out of the rubble. When the camera focused on the Captain again, he was making some sort of service announcement about how they’d fix the city, FEMA was incoming, and they’d rebuild San Francisco. 

Loki wanted to say, “He looks ridiculous.” But instead he said, “You’re probably right, George.”

Loki cooked dinner that evening, his hands going through the motion, even if he didn’t remember how he’d learned to cook. 

“My Mable was the best cook you’d ever meet,” George confided over the old walnut dining table. The table was much too large for just two people, and so they sat at one end, the rest of the table a massive plane that stretched out before them. “But you’re not bad, either,” George smiled.

The man had an old record player, and the scratchy sounds of some big band came streaming out. Loki could’ve sworn he’d never heard the music before, but it comforted him in a way he didn’t understand. He stabbed at his lasagna. 

“We used to dance to this, Mable and I. She was such a dancer, even after she got Alzheimer’s. It’s a bad way to go. I know I’m a terrible man, but sometimes, I wish she’d died before she got it. It wasn’t so bad in the beginning, but,” And George trailed off, looking at his dinner. “I need some Whiskey.”

“I’ll get it,” Loki offered, pushing away from the table. He added a liberal amount to George’s glass, knowing the old man liked it dry. Pouring himself a glass, he set them down on the table. George smiled at him in gratitude. 

“Forgive me. I am old, and I live in my memories.”

Loki said nothing, allowing the old man to regale him with tales of his youth.

He thought that once, it may have bothered him. But without memories of his own, he enjoyed hearing George’s; wondered who would tell his tales when he was gone. 

After they’d finished the bottle and George was unsteady on his feet and Loki felt nothing at all, George offered to teach him how to dance. “All the ladies love it.”

“I highly doubt it,” Loki said with a raised eyebrow. He’d heard the modern music on the radio while driving George’s truck on errands, and it hardly seemed danceable. 

George waved his concerns away. “I promise you. Nothing impresses a woman like a man who knows how to dance.”

Loki looked at George with an open look of surprise on face. His words had sparked something in his brain that was as gone as quickly as it was there, but he couldn’t shake the thought of Captain America. Perturbed, he drained his glass dry and wondered why it didn’t affect him like it should.

“You okay, Loki?”

“Fine.”

“Okay,” George stumbled to his feet. “You’ll have to be the woman. With your hair, you should be okay with that. Are you sure you don’t want me to cut it for you? Give you a nice, tidy military cut?”

“Quite sure.”

“Okay, okay,” George smiled. “Get on up here.”

“I assure you, I’m quite all right.”

George’s arthritic hands grabbed his, and Loki allowed himself to be pulled from his chair, wondering, not for the first time, how an old man could be so strong. 

George was bumbling, his words slurring even as he tried to explain that Loki needed to start with a rock back on his left foot--or was it his right? The man grew limp in his grip, his head falling to Loki’s chest.

“George?”

But George was asleep. Sighing, Loki scooped the old man up (and he was so light) and carried him to bed.

George peeked a blue eye at him. “You should be doing this with a woman,” he confided drunkenly.

Loki rolled his eyes as he climbed the stairs. Settling the old man into his bed, he tucked him in. George grabbed his hand as he turned to leave. “You shouldn’t be wasting your youth on an old man like me. Go, find the woman you’ve always dreamed of.”

Loki stood awkwardly before wresting George’s hand away from his. “This is where I belong.” But he wasn’t sure that was true. 

George gave him a long, sad look before his eyes slid shut and he began snoring almost immediately.

Smiling wryly, Loki headed back downstairs to clean up. 

As Begine the Beguine by Artie Shaw streamed from the record player, Loki wondered why he couldn’t shake Captain America’s face from his memory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Harmony on the James" is based off a home I looked to get married at. I didn't choose that home, and the marriage didn't last, but the place left a lasting impression on me. Virginia is full of old plantation homes whose owners are trying to find a future. When I first devised of Harmony on the James, our current climate wasn't as contentious, and so, now that I have finally published this work, I felt it worth addressing. George is from a family of plantation owners, but he knows what they did was wrong.


	3. Little Parcels of an Endless Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki Loves

_I was born with a heart of stone  
Till you came along and you broke my throne  
Now here I stand with your hand in mine  
Still a humble man till the end of time_

-Priory

In April, attacks came to America’s major cities with alarming regularity. Between errands and making a stone path of old bricks George had collected, Loki caught the intermittent reports.

A recon mission had been thwarted by the Avengers.

An attack on Seattle was waylaid.

In July, as Loki tended the crops he’d planted, “A victory garden,” George confided with a smile, and Loki wondered why the words resonated with him, the radio he carried with him told him the aliens that attacked Manhattan several years ago were back. On TV, their massive forms filled the air; giant creatures that swam along as fish in the ocean, unimpeded by the laws of gravity.

In August, George complained of a pain in his stomach. Loki got him to a doctor in Richmond. A week later, they were told it was cancer. Suddenly, the concerns of the Avengers seemed very far away. 

George denied treatment. “I’m an old man, and I’ve seen what chemo does,” he told Loki on the ride back. “We can’t live forever.”

“But you can live a little longer,” Loki said, because he couldn’t imagine a world without the old man.

“We all die, Loki,” George looked over at him from the passenger's seat, his eyes tired. “Best I get ready.”

Death came painfully. George gradually became slower; spent more time sleeping. Some days, the pain was so bad that he couldn’t get out of bed. Loki moved his bedroom to the ground floor, so he wouldn’t have to climb the stairs. He made meals that George tried to eat with gusto, but mostly pushed around on the plate. They abandoned the dinner table, and Loki bought a tray so George could enjoy his food at beside. 

“Soon, you’ll be able to go find a woman and live your life,” George told Loki over a dish of roasted chicken and root vegetables harvested from the garden. 

The thought didn’t appeal to him.

The nights grew longer.

0o0o0o0o0o

Loki helped George carve a pumpkin (and for who, Loki would never know. But at the end of the night, there were two grinning pumpkins on the stoop with a candle flickering inside, and Loki helped George down the stairs of the grand old porch. He smiled and nodded, pleased with their work.)

On Halloween, nobody came. Nobody ever did, and Loki and George ate the candy by themselves and watched Grade B films on TBS.

Loki called George’s children for Thanksgiving after they had refused their father's call, but they insisted they were busy, and Loki cursed them for cowards. He hung up on them when the accused him for being a treasure hunter. After, he watched videos on George’s dial up and even though the turkey was a little dry and the potatoes under cooked, George swore it was the best Thanksgiving he’d had since Mabel’s passing. He told Loki of the Thanksgivings he’d had in Europe. The military had done their best, flying in turkeys when they could. Usually, it was C-rations, but they always made a night of it, except when they were fighting. 

Loki decorated George’s tree as the old man sat before the fire. Glen Miller was on the record player, and George told him in a thin voice where each ornament had come from.

“I got that for Mabel in 1956. We got it when we visited St. Augestine. We took a trip to the Florida that year, and toured the whole of the state. We spent a week in the Keyes. Have you been to the Keyes?”

Loki nodded his head. He had been everywhere, in search for something.

“Time slows there. We had the greatest time—my daughter, Julie, was well, she was born nine months later, if you catch my drift.” George winked. After a moment, he gave a great sigh. “Loki, I miss my Mabel so much.”

Loki, speechless, stared down at the ornament in his hand. It was faded and fragile, and it held no value at all except for the man and the woman he’d bought if for. When George died, it would only be an old piece of glass. 

When he was done draping the garland around the fireplace, he settled into his designated chair.

They watched the fire together. When it died, Loki helped George to bed.

 

0o0o0o0o0o

The battles grew in ferocity during the spring. Loki and George sat fixated on the TV screen. The reporters had changed, growing more cautious with each anchor they replaced. George spent most of his days napping; in his bed, in his chair, before the fire, when it was cold enough. In the sun, when it wasn’t.

During a moment of lucidity, George grabbed Loki’s arm. “You belong there,” George gestured towards the screen. “Leave me,” he pleaded.

“I won’t,” Loki swore.

And although his memories escaped him, Loki was a man of his word (though it was seldom truly given, and Loki wondered where that knowledge had come from.) and he remained by George’s side.

The doctor insisted they hire Hospice; that George’s days were numbered. 

But Loki drove into Richmond and took classes on nursing, and learned how to give George an IV, how to give him his drugs when his pain overwhelmed him.

In May of that year, when the blossoms were in full bloom and the lawn was bright and green, George quoted, “I could not die when the leaves are green, for I loved the time too well.”

“You’ll never die,” Loki said, and he’d almost begun to believe it.

Loki lined George’s new walkway in American Flags on Memorial Day, and he stood on the stairs as the wheelchair bound man said a prayer for men Loki had never known, for the teams he’d only ever seen on TV.

In June, George pleaded that Loki go to the Avengers when he died. “You are a warrior. It’s in your eyes, even if you can’t remember.”

Loki agreed, because he did not know how to deny a dying man.

By October, the war had moved to DC, and the Avengers along with it, New York a smoldering ruin save for the Avenger’s tower, tall among the destruction, the flickering “A” defiant among the smoke.

In November, Loki sat beside George’s bed when the old man found he could no longer rise. He was largely incoherent. Once, on the night of the eighth, he’d looked at Loki with surprisingly aware eyes. “I wish I’d died in June,” he said. “It’s a more friendly month.”

But he didn’t. He died on a cold November day. The calendar marked is at the 11th, and Loki’d lined the walkway once more in little flags for the people that’d never come marking a day that most Americans associated with a long weekend.

He told George’s children of his passing, but was gone before their arrival.

He buried the old man in his familial graveyard. Except for Mable’s headstone, the markers were old and cracked, sunken against the earth. Because he was no stonesmith, Loki fashioned a wooden cross and left a terse note for his absent children.

The trains to DC were intermittent, and when they stopped in Quantico, the rails destroyed in an attack, he hitchhiked as far as he could go. And when the cars could go no farther, he walked.

0o0o0o0o0o

 

Loki had eyes on Captain America, perched precariously on the roof of the Pentagon. 

There was a sinking feeling in his chest as he realized the Pentagon was the highest building still standing in DC proper. 

He passed through the metal detectors unimpeded. Bypassing the smoking elevators, he took the stairs two at a time. 

By the time he reached the roof, Captain America was gone. Orienting himself, Loki sought the place he’d last seen him. Bolting to the edge of the roof, his heart squeezed with expectation. He was sure the Captain would be a broken mess on the ground below.

Instead, the Avenger was handing precariously from the edge. Numerous wounds were apparent against his uniform, gushing blood. His right leg was almost entirely red and his chest was a smoldering wreck. His cowl had been blown away, leaving a bloody face. Still, his blue eyes were piercing, his blonde hair stark against a blackened and bloody face. His mouth opened in an “O.”

Loki grabbed Captain America’s hand just as the man’s grip loosened.

The Captain’s hand automatically wrapped around Loki’s forearm, and as Captain America dangled in the air five stories up, held only by Loki’s tenuous grip, Loki remembered who he was. 

He almost let go.

“Loki?” And Captain America was just Steve, and his voice was a pained whisper.

Loki tightened his grip, hauling the man, his partner, his shared soul, up over the edge of the building. Steve rolled over, gasping and clutching his leg with his free arm. But he didn’t let go of Loki. “How?” He sputtered.

There were a thousand words Loki would say, and none of them mattered if they didn’t win this battle. He wrenched himself from Steve, feeling the magic in his veins once more. He knew his enemy, knew their weakness, and he launched everything he had at them even as the building crumbled around them in a consolidated attacked.

When he was done, the ships falling to the streets like broken toys, Loki fell beside Steve, his magic spent.

“They won’t recover,” Loki promised.

Steve was pale beneath his blood. It pooled around him on the broken rooftop as his heart pumped through the tear in his femoral artery. Loki dug into his thigh, searching for the tear in the artery and knotting it together. Steve howled in pain. When he was finished, Steve assessed at him with glazed eyes.

“The team?”

“They live,” Loki said. Steve nodded.

“How...?”

“I don’t know.”

Steve smiled, slipping into unconsciousness.

Loki carried him home.

0o0o0o0o0o00

Loki’s legs were crossed, delicate hands turning the pages of his book, his pale face vivid in the spring sun. A warm wind blew in from the west through the cracked window, promising warmth and life. The chimes Steve had set up last year sung softly in the evening wind. He made to turn the page, and looked up in habit, as he had done for months. He was surprised to see Steve looking back at him.

 

“You staying this time?” Loki asked shortly.

“I think so,” Steve said, shifting himself to a sitting position. His face winced in anticipation, and eased when none of his wounds complained.

“It’s been long enough,” Loki raised his brows.

“You died,” Steve accused. 

“So did you.” Loki closed his book, marking his pages with a folded corner 

“How long have I been out?”

“We feared you wouldn’t wake,” Loki said carefully. And it was we not I, and Loki hated that even now, he couldn’t muster the courage to say what he meant. 

“I’m not that easy to take out,” Steve said with a faint grin. 

“No,” Loki returned with a smile that started at the edge of his lips before becoming full fledged as he recognized, at last, how much he loved this human. “I don’t suppose you are. Welcome home, Steve Rogers.”

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this a while ago, but I'm finally ready to post it. Hope I still have readers for Fairytales and Other Forms of Suicide. How I have missed writing! I hope you guys enjoy this. Comment if it pleases you <3


End file.
